DeMarvion Overshown said he had asked for something bigger. The Dallas Cowboys linebacker played his first game in six weeks on Monday night, intercepted Tanner McKee in the fourth quarter of a 38-21 win over the Philadelphia Eagles, and said afterward: “As I pray for an interception, I wanted to be a pick-six, but God gave me the interception. That’s good enough in the box score.”
Overshown had six tackles, five of them solo, one tackle for loss, two passes defensed and the interception. With 7:55 left and Dallas ahead 31-21, McKee threw short to the right for Dallas Goedert on first-and-10 from the Dallas 32. Overshown stepped in front of it at the 30 and returned it 4 yards before Goedert pushed him out of bounds. Philadelphia did not score again.
“I lost two of my most supportive people”
Overshown hurt his hamstring late in the season opener against the New York Giants on September 13 and missed the next five games, in which Dallas went 2-3. He said the time away was about more than the injury. “I was dealing with a lot, not just the hamstring, but off the field,” he said. “I lost two of my most supportive people in my life. So it was more than just dealing with the hamstring.”
“It’s hard when you go through stuff and you kind of sit back and wonder, like, man, why me? Why me?” Overshown said. “It feels like God is doing exactly what he told me he was going to do.” He said he sees himself as “a soldier” who keeps being put through adversity, “because that’s my calling. My calling is to help people get through adversity, help people get through the tough times.”
He also said sitting out had been hard to watch. “Sitting on the sideline is not fun for me, because I know what we went through,” he said. “Being back out there on the field is a blessing.” He did not know how much he would play. “I was prepared this week. Didn’t know how much I was going to play, but I feel like I played the whole game,” he said.
“Next time I’m going to go to the closer end zone”
After the interception, Overshown ran the length of the field to celebrate with his teammates in the far end zone, where the defense staged a bowling routine. “It felt good, but the next time I’m going to go to the closer end zone,” he said. He said the plan changed in the huddle: “We was going to do something else, but then I felt like the clock was running out. So I was like, you know what? Let’s just bowl. I like bowling.” He added: “We’re going to practice, so there’s going to be some more takeaways to come.”
He described the play itself as a read from one snap earlier. “The play before that, we kind of ran the same kind of route concept, and me and Hook communicated on the next play that we was going to kind of play a different technique to it,” he said. He said the Eagles wanted the ball out fast with the clock running, and that McKee would be throwing quickly. He said defensive coordinator Christian Parker messaged him before the game: “Bro, you a dog, I’m happy to have you back.” The message, he said, was to trust his instincts, “and that’s exactly what I did on that play call.”
“Not allow more than 10, seven points”
In the locker room, head coach Brian Schottenheimer listed the night’s standouts for the team, including “D-Mo had an interception.” Linebacker Shemar James, who started and wore the green-dot helmet that carries the defensive calls, said Overshown makes his job “so much easier.” “You just tell him the plan, he go do it,” James said. He described the night this way: “Keep choppin’. Keep choppin’. Eventually the tree gonna fall, and that’s what happened tonight.”
Overshown said the defense, which got several players back on Monday, is still beating itself. “When we look at our film and we look at what we given up even today, it’s just like, man, we beating ourselves,” he said. “How can we just make them earn it? Like, make him play quarterback.” He said that once the mental errors come down from three or four a game to zero, “I think you’re going to really start seeing this defense not allow more than 10, seven points. Like, we got that ability.”
He said the group is learning how Parker likes to work. “He’s getting confident, he’s getting more comfortable each week,” Overshown said. “We can go to him and talk about anything that we feel like, hey, we can get a beat on this, and he’ll dial it up.”
The win moved Dallas to 3-4. The Cowboys host the Arizona Cardinals at AT&T Stadium on Sunday, November 1, at 1:00 p.m. ET, which is 8:00 p.m. in Cairo.
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